This week Jesus once again walks through walls to meet with the disciples and they are once again startled and start to believe they’re seeing an apparition because…c’mon…it can’t be real, right?

So Jesus says (once again), “Look at my hands! See the holes in my feet? Check out this huge gash in my side. Do figments of your imagination have wounds?”

But still the disciples are like, “Nah…can’t be real.”

So Jesus, pondering the situation, says that he has to prove he’s real by doing something very human, very alive, very real: he eats in front of them. The fish goes down the gullet and into his intestines and, well, if you want to know the rest of the story ask a 2nd Grader and they’ll update you on food digestion. Trust me: I have a 2nd Grader living in my house.

The disciples wanted proof, and Jesus goes to great lengths to prove that his body is real. His wounds are real. And, yes, his resurrection sacredness is real.

Now, Beloved, fast forward some 2000 years and see the world we live in today, a world that still claims it “wants proof” but happily believes whatever it wants to. Case in point?

How many videos of black and brown bodies being shot up and harassed do we need to see before we take seriously that this is a big damn problem?!

But, no, it must be a figment of the imagination, right?

Look at the shot up body of the young man, Daunte Wright, in Brooklyn Center.

It’s the ghost of racism past…that was then, this is now!

Look at the swollen eyes of Second Lieutenant Nazario pepper sprayed after asking why he was being pulled over.

Look at the cuffed hands of George Floyd as he lies lifeless face down trying to do the most human of things: breathe.

Look at the shot up hands and feet of Breonna Taylor after people with power tried to walk through the walls of her apartment without asking.

This is not fake. This is not a figment of the imagination.

This is real, by God.

How much proof do we need? How many videos do we need? How many testimonies do we need?!

See the bodies. See the wounds.

But do you see the sacredness?

If I were preaching this week, I’d probably go here…and yes, it’d probably get me in trouble.

But that’s good trouble.